Soulstruck
by nightwalker3
Summary: A soul-eating ice monster is loose in the city, but it's invisible and intangible, and Yuusuke's pretty sure he can't kill what he can't catch. Also, Kuwabara and Kurama might be dead. Sort of. Again.


**Author's Note:** This was written as a gift fic ages ago and I never posted it because I was pretty sure it sucked. But lj user="lady_flamewing" (my favorite fiancé)and lj user="jenjinn" graciously beta-read it for me, and then I rewrote a few chunks of it and added an actual ending, and now I like it much better. Any lingering suckiness is all my fault and cannot be blamed in any way on my betas.

This story is set in the same universe as _Running with the Crow_. Reading that story is highly recommended but not at all necessary to understand this one. All you need to know is that Kurama died, badly, then came back, more badly, and eventually he and Kuwabara opened up a very unsuccessful private detective agency together where they fight demonic crime and are constantly broke. On to the story!

Happy Birthday/Merry Christmas, Sonnet. This story, like so much of what I write, is all your fault.

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**Soulstruck  
**

The warehouse district was not what Kurama would consider a particularly pleasant part of town. It was old, and run-down, largely abandoned in favor of the more recently built warehouses that lined the waterfront. These all had a stale air about them, and there was little sign of human activity. Few workers came here anymore, and the main inhabitants appeared to be rats. Even most of the criminals preferred the waterfront these days.

Kurama was, unfortunately, quite familiar with the warehouse district.

He stretched lazily and readjusted his position on a thick branch close to the trunk of the tree. He felt a little ridiculous perched there, spying on an abandoned building, waiting to get the jump on some two-bit thief. A hundred years ago he'd have died of shame if told he'd come to this.

A hundred years ago he'd have just tracked the thief down and taken the damned jewelry back. Assuming it was expensive enough to interest him. Instead, he was spending half the night in a tree for what amounted to about two week's survival pay.

_+We really need to start charging more.+_ Kuwabara's voice filled his head, echoing his own thoughts.

Kurama smiled to himself. _+We need regular customers to charge before we can worry about charging them more.+_

_+For a city that's been invaded by demons three times in the last ten years, you'd think there'd be more call for paranormal investigators.+ _

Something moved beneath him. Kurama glanced down through the leaves and saw a young human man, about thirty or so and dressed conspicuously in all black, approach the building slowly. _+Someone's here.+_

_+Where?+_

_+Right beneath me. He's about to knock.+_

_+Does he have it with him?+  
_  
Kurama studied the stranger. _+There's something in his pocket. Could just be a gun, I suppose.+_

_+Wonderful.+_

The man knocked three times, very deliberately, then stopped and waited. Kurama concentrated and heard footsteps inside the building. _+Hiroshi's answering the door.+_

_+Good boy. Let's hope he doesn't screw us over this time.+_

The kitsune bit back a grin at the aggravation conveyed in the younger man's thoughts, but privately agreed. He was in no mood for foolish stunts, and after the last time Hiroshi had used up all his second chances at one go.

The door opened and the man in black stepped forward, reaching into his pocket. Kurama tensed, but all he removed was a black cloth. _+Attack of the stereotypical villain,+_ he sighed. _+Don't they know that people are going to pay more attention to them if they dress like that? No self-respecting thief walks around dressed like that.+_

_+Yeah, the good ones just wear gauze.+_

_+It was silk.+_

_+It looked like gauze.+_

_+It did not! That was all silk. Do you know what I paid for that outfit?+_ Kurama aimed a dark look at the warehouse.

_+I dunno. What does six meters of gauze go for? A few bucks, I'm sure.+_

Kurama rolled his eyes and bit back a sigh. _+We need to work on your appreciation for the finer things in life.+_

_+Oh, __**hell**__ no.+_

Hiroshi stood aside and let the man in black enter, casting a vaguely nervous glance around outside as he did so. Kurama caught a whiff of nerves before Hiroshi pulled the door closed behind him and very carefully did not trip the lock. _+He's inside. What do you see?+_Kurama quickly scanned the area around the warehouse, searching for signs of any backup. The man in black seemed to have come alone. He shifted his weight and gripped the tree branch, ready to drop down on a moment's notice.

+Not a whole hell of a lot, unless rats count for anything.+

+Give them a minute to reach your location.+

_+He's got it! It's all wrapped up in a black towel, but it's got to be what we're looking for. If we move now, we've got him.+_

_+We didn't get paid to bring in the thief,+_ Kurama said lightly. _+Just the locket.+_

_+No, but it has been several weeks since we had any fun.+_

Kurama laughed to himself as he swung down from the tree. _+He doesn't look like he's going to be much of a challenge. No reiki, no youki.+_ He rested his hand on the door frame and waited.

_+Maybe he's armed.+ _

_+You sound far too happy about that possibility,+_ Kurama scolded.

_+Move in on three?+ _

_+One.+_

+Two.+

Kurama kicked in the door.

The warehouse was darker than the moonlit outdoors had been, but Kurama could still clearly make out the two men standing in the center of the empty space. Hiroshi and the man in black jumped away from each other, the black cloth and the small silver locket falling to the ground. Hiroshi scrambled away until his back hit the wall behind him, but the other man lunged for the locket.

Kurama smiled politely. "I'll be taking that, if you don't mind," he said.

The thief was eyeing him, trying to evaluate him and no doubt coming up a little short. _The hair always throws them off_, Kurama mused cheerfully. The thief slowly regained his feet, the locket clenched in one hand. "How about I just take this and leave?" he suggested. "Unless you think you've got some magic trick up your sleeve that can stop me?"

Hiroshi whimpered.

"It's funny you should put it that way," Kurama told him. "I have any number of things up my sleeve." He bared his teeth. Even without his fangs, it must have been impressive, because the thief took a step back.

He tensed, and Kurama waited, trying to judge if the thief was going to go through or around him, but instead he spun around and ran for the back of the warehouse.

Kurama grinned. _+He's coming your way.+_

_+I know.+_

Hiroshi tentatively approached, his face suggesting that he'd rather be playing in a pit of vipers, or perhaps toying with a rabid dog. "There's a back entrance," he said timidly. "He could get out?"

Somewhere in the back, the thief suddenly started shouting. There was the sound of an extremely brief struggle. Then silence.

"Oh," Hiroshi said. "Never mind, then."

Kuwabara emerged from the shadows at the back of the warehouse, grinning widely, with the thief stumbling along in front of him. "Tried to go through me."

Kurama laughed. "They always do."

Taking their apparent good humor as a signal, Hiroshi waved and took a few steps toward the door Kurama had kicked in. "It really is wonderful working with you guys, I mean it. Great job. Next time, don't hesitate to ca-ack!" He jerked to a stop as Kuwabara grabbed the back of his coat. "Unless you need me to stick around?" he added.

"This is why we love working with you, Hiro," Kuwabara said dryly. "You learn so fast."

"What did this guy tell you?" Kurama asked, eyeing the thief. He was only slightly the worse for wear after his rather poor choice to face down Kuwabara and appeared to be regaining his balance fairly quickly. "Kuwabara, the locket?"

"I've got it."

"He didn't say much, really," Hiroshi shrugged. "Just the same thing he told me at the pre-meeting. That he'd found it and he needed a buyer. Apparently he was having trouble selling it."

That fit in with what they knew about the situation. Three antiques brokers and a half dozen pawnshops recognized the description of the locket as something that had been offered to them in the last week, but each had refused to purchase it for one reason or another. Most had claimed that something about the whole situation felt a little off, but they had been referring to the locket, not the seller.

Kuwabara had the locket in his hand, and the silver stood out starkly against his black gloves. He held it up and though there were no lights on in the warehouse, it glinted. "There's definitely something off about this thing," he said. "What did the client tell us? That it was haunted?"

"Ah. By her grandmother, apparently."

_+No. Not by her grandmother.+_ Kuwabara closed his fist over the locket. _+Kurama, forget the thief. There's something in the locket.+_

"Hiroshi, would you escort our friend out of here?" Kurama let a little tone of command slip into the request, just in case Hiroshi was feeling recalcitrant. "We have some little business left to clear up here."

"How am I supposed to keep him from getting away?" Hiroshi demanded.

"You've got a gun under that jacket," Kuwabara snapped. "Even though you swore you were coming unarmed this time."

Hiroshi stammered a denial, but Kurama waved it away. "Take him and go, Hiroshi. Get him out of the area and then you can go home."

"And _him_? What if he struggles?"

"What," Kuwabara said in mock surprise, "you don't have any handcuffs on you this time?"

"Oh come on! You're not still mad about that?"

"Hiroshi, do you want me to _make_ you leave?"

Very few people felt like arguing with Kuwabara when he got that tone. Hiroshi was definitely not one of them. He pulled his gun and grabbed the thief by the arm, leading him out of the warehouse at a pace just short of a dead run.

Kurama kept an ear on their progress until they hit the road and started back toward the city. Then he turned his full attention to the locket Kuwabara held in his fist.

"There's something in here," Kuwabara repeated absently. His hand flared briefly with reiki, fire-orange and bright in the dark, as he probed the locket carefully.

"A ghost?" Kurama asked, watching it warily for a reaction.

The locket clicked open. There was a pause, like someone taking a breath before a jump.

Then everything froze. Literally.

****

Kurama didn't so much wake, as he became aware of his surroundings again. He was tired, and his head hurt and he was _cold_. Freezing. But aside from the cold, he couldn't feel anything.

_I've gone numb_, he thought, surprised that he could still be so affected by temperature.

He concentrated on feeling and got nothing except a strange tugging sensation at the back of his mind and in his chest. He rubbed his chest, and was relieved to feel the contact. _So I can still move._

It was also dark, but he had a sneaking suspicion that was because his eyes were still closed. He opened them slowly, expecting some pain as they adjusted to whatever light there was, and realized that it was blazingly bright and he didn't hurt at all.

He opened them wide, and sat up.

It was easily mid-afternoon, and he was lying on the pavement outside the warehouse. It took a moment for him to get his bearings beyond that, but by his reckoning, he was sitting on a direct line backwards from where he had been standing when the locket opened. _Whatever was in there must have… thrown me?_

He eyed the intact warehouse wall, and scratched that idea.

_Then someone carried me out here. Maybe Kuwabara- Kuwabara!_

He regained his feet, feeling weak in his legs, and the headache pulsed unpleasantly as he did. There was no sign of Kuwabara anywhere around him. No sign of anyone for that matter, not even footsteps to show that someone had brought him out there.

An unpleasant feeling started to grow in the back of his throat. He swallowed it and walked around the warehouse toward the front door. It was still half open from Hiroshi's sudden departure; he reached out to pull it open. He stopped when his hand went through the door.

He pulled his hand back, paused, and tried again. His hand never met the door. Instead it passed through, sinking up to his wrist. He didn't move his hand, but craned his head to see his fingers poking through the other side. He wriggled them.

"Kuwabara was right," he said. "We need to start charging more." His voice sounded strange to his own ears. He set his shoulders and stepped through the door and inside the warehouse.

In the daylight, the interior was even less appealing that it had been the night before. Kurama could clearly see the dirt and cobwebs that had piled up during the months the warehouse had stood empty, and the dust on the floor was disturbed from their encounter with the thief. In the center of it all were two large marks in the dust. About the size of two grown men.

Kurama raised his hand to eye level and watched the dust motes pass through it. _I have such a bad feeling about this._

The two large marks had a trail leading away from them – two thin trails in the dust, with the occasional scuff. It looked to Kurama's eye as if someone had picked them up and dragged them away by their shoulders, leaving their heels to drag in the dust. It also looked as if they'd been dropped once or twice on the way out. Kurama checked his own feet, but he wasn't leaving any marks in the dust.

The trail led through the back of the warehouse, where they abruptly ended. Kurama knelt down, examining the cement floor for any further signs. The back of the warehouse was full of old machinery and broken furniture, discarded uniforms, piping, coils of wire and enough rats and birds' nests to start a small reserve. The back door was wide open, and the floor in front of it showed signs of having been disturbed. Something large had been there, but wasn't any longer.

A flash of color caught his eye, and he peered closer at an old rusted pipe sticking out of from a pile of garbage. A small piece of bright blue plastic was stuck to the corroded pipe, waving in the breeze caused by the open door. "A tarp," he murmured. "They set a tarp out on the floor and wrapped us up in it before taking us outside." He straightened up, and looked back toward the warehouse. "Who is it, though? Who knew we were here?"

The footsteps of whoever had dragged them away were almost entirely obscured by the marks made by their bodies. Kurama traced the trail carefully, piecing together each fragment until he had a good idea of what the footprint looked like.

Then he went back to the front door.

"Hiroshi," he growled under his breath. "What the hell are you playing at?"

And what had happened to Kuwabara? Was the human in the same situation as he? Or – Kurama frowned at the marks on the floor – was he still in his body?

Kurama stood for a moment, eying the far wall. Then he walked through it.

He saw Kuwabara immediately. The younger man was surrounded by garbage, slumped against a dumpster across from him. He didn't appear injured, but he was transparent. Kurama knelt at his side and touched his shoulder, relieved when he touched cloth instead of sinking through it. "Kuwabara-kun?" He shook his partner slightly. "Wake up. We missed all the fun."

Kuwabara groaned, and pulled away from Kurama's touch, slumping to the side and sliding right through a rather nasty looking piece of rusted metal. Kurama winced, but Kuwabara didn't even notice. A convulsive shudder ripped through the younger man and he curled in on himself, sending the metal shard back into his chest. Kurama stared in horrified fascination. "Kuwabara-kun, wake up."

"_Cold._" Another shudder shook through him, but Kuwabara was awake and staring at him. "Kurama?"

"It's me. There was something in the locket-"

Kuwabara's face hardened, and his eyes went blank. "I can see _through_ you," he said harshly.

"Yes, that does seem to be a problem, doesn't it?" Kurama kept his voice light and deliberate. He had a feeling he knew what had set his friend off, but this wasn't the time – and definitely not the place. "Kuwabara, can you sit up? I can't concentrate with that thing," he gestured to the metal shard, "there."

Frowning, Kuwabara looked down, then swore and jerked upright so quickly that he almost knocked them both over. He scrambled away from the dumpster, and pressed a hand against his chest. "What the-" He glanced down again. "Kurama?"

"Yes?"

"Are we dead?" There was a definite note of "_again?_" in his voice.

"I don't believe so," Kurama said carefully.

"No ferrygirls." Kuwabara shivered again and climbed to his feet. "And no Koenma laughing. I'm pretty sure he'd show up just to rub it in that we were killed by a piece of jewelry."

"What were you able to sense from the locket?" Kurama questioned urgently. "What do you remember before waking up out here?"

"Cold. Very cold. Angry." His eyes seemed to focus somewhere beyond Kurama. "Hungry."

"Were you able to tell what it was?"

"A snake." Kuwabara shook himself roughly, like he was shaking off the memory. "Serpent-like. Big? I don't know. Not a demon, though. Something else." He glanced over his shoulder at the warehouse, apparently putting together the same pieces Kurama had. "Our bodies?"

"Gone. Hiroshi dragged us off. In a tarp, I think."

"Oh, for-" Kuwabara rubbed a hand over his eyes. "This shit never happened to Dick Tracy."

Kurama cast him an amused glance. "Does that make me Tess Trueheart?"

"You'd look terrible as a blond." Kuwabara visibly braced himself, then poked a finger through the wall of the warehouse. "So, now what?"

"We should find the others, see if we can communicate with them, despite our current situation. Genkai may know what's happened to us. I suspect that whatever was in that locket merely separated us from our bodies, as opposed to killing us."

"That's much better," Kuwabara said dryly.

"It means," Kurama said firmly, "that if we can find our bodies in time, we may be able to get back _in_ them. Assuming Hiroshi hasn't done something foolish."

"I'd call dragging us off in a tarp to be pretty damn foolish," Kuwabara snapped. "What was he even doing here? We told him to leave."

"Perhaps he heard something when the being in the locket broke lose and came back. He saw us, thought we were dead and panicked." Kurama brushed off his jeans, even though the dirt of the alley didn't seem to be able to touch him. "Whatever his motivation, we need to find out what he's done with us before it's too late." _If it isn't already._

"If it isn't already," Kuwabara said gruffly. "All right. But the next time I see that little rat, I'm breaking both his arms. And you're not going to stop me this time, right?"

"Trust me, Kuwabara-kun. I'll _help_."

****

Urameshi Yuusuke woke to the sound of school bells ringing.

He rolled over, kicking the sheet away with an aggravated twist of his leg and glared balefully at the open bedroom window. There was an elementary school down the block and every day he was there Yuusuke could hear the bells ringing and the sound of students rushing off to school. Keiko had laughed when he called it a nightmarish hell and claimed it was just his guilty conscience talking.

Conscience or whatever, it made sleeping in on the weekdays difficult. Not that he didn't try anyway, grabbing a well-stuffed pillow and pulling it over his head. He was tired, he wanted to sleep. He chanted that over and over in his mind. _I'm going back to sleep. I am asleep. I am asleep. Shut the hell up you stupid fucking bell_.

Funny how the bell almost sounded like screaming.

His eyes flew open and he pulled the pillow away from his face. Screaming. Not "tag, you're it!" screaming or even "Ew! Satoshi _kissed_ me!" screaming, but "Oh, my tiny, infant god we're all going to die!" screaming. Bogeyman screaming. Monster under the bed screaming.

Good-luck-trying-to-sleep-in-you-sorry-bastard screaming.

_Son of a bitch,_ he thought tiredly as he jammed his feet into his shoes and shimmied into a pair of jeans, then fell over sideways and tried it again in reverse. _Always on my days off._

Not that he worked, or anything, but still.

He took the stairs at a run, skidding down the banister at one point to avoid a group of women clustered together on the landing. He burst through the front doors, ignoring the stares and startled cries he drew from the people gathered together in the street. Everyone was standing around in twos and threes, pointing and staring down the road in the direction of the school, although as yet no one seemed inclined to investigate further.

A half dozen cars screeched to a halt as he raced across the street, vaulting across the hood of a taxi and dodging the front end of a sedan full of women. Horns blared at him angrily, and he waved cheerfully just to piss them off.

There were little kids running down the road crying, a couple of them running into the road, others racing down the sidewalks. Yuusuke hesitated at the edge of the schoolyard, looking for the source of the trouble. He couldn't feel any sort of youki, and he couldn't see any human antagonist.

_Man, if this is some stupid game, I'm gonna be really pissed_.

He reached out and snagged the next kid who ran past, grabbing the backpack of a little boy in short pants and knee socks. The kid screeched at an ear-splitting decibel, making Yuusuke flinch. "Knock it off!" Yuusuke snapped.

Startled into silence, the kid gaped up at him.

"What's going on in there?" Yuusuke demanded, jerking a thumb toward the schoolyard.

The kid trembled under his hand, making Yuusuke feel kind of guilty. He hadn't meant to scare the kid more than he already was. He dropped down to his knees so he could see the kid at eye level, although he didn't let go of his shirt. "Hey," he said, gentling his voice. "Sorry. Didn't meant to snap at you. I just heard all the yelling and got worried."

That worked, and the kid calmed visibly, although he continued to shake.

"What's your name?"

"K-Kazuya." The kid sniffled and rubbed his arm over his face.

"Kazuya, what's going on over there?"

"C-Cold." Kazuya trembled again. "It's cold."

_He's not shaking cause he's scared – he's shivering! _Yuusuke touched his free hand to the kid's arm. It was freezing. He let go, and the kid ran off.

It had to be a demon. What else could it be? It was April for crying out loud, it's not like the kid was out playing in the snow. An ice demon could have that effect. Yuusuke flashed on a mental image of Yukina rampaging through a playground full of elementary school kids. _Well, a__** different **__ice demon._

But what kind of ice demon didn't have ki? Yuusuke surveyed the schoolyard, glancing over the benches, the huddled groups of children. Nothing. Not so much as a hint of youki.

A little girl, about seven years old, was lying unmoving on the grass just a few feet away. Yuusuke jogged to her side and crouched, reaching out to check on her. She was cold as ice, her skin tinged blue and nearly hard to the touch. Frozen. Yuusuke carefully held his hand in front of her mouth, but several long moments passed and he didn't feel any breath.

The air around him grew cold so quickly that the almost seemed to snap under the weight of it. He shivered convulsively and rose to his feet, staring wildly around him. What could-

The cold slammed against his back and _through_ him with enough force to make him stagger. His breath froze in his throat, and he thought he could actually feel his heart falter. For just a second he couldn't breathe, couldn't move, and his knees very nearly gave out.

Then it was over.

"What was that?" Yuusuke raised a hand in front of his face, staring at the frost that had formed over his skin. "What the _hell_ was that?"

Teachers were pouring into the schoolyard in droves, and people were running in off the street to see what the disturbance was. As Yuusuke stood shivering, an ambulance screeched to a halt in front of the school.

"Sir? Sir? Are you all right?" An older woman, a teacher from the look of her, reached for Yuusuke's arm and drew back when she saw the rapidly thawing frost that covered it. "What _happened_ out here?"

Yuusuke shook his head, rubbing his hands together. The children were slowly starting to calm down as parents and teachers coaxed them toward the school and ambulances. No one showed any sign that they were still feeling the cold that had attacked him.

It had definitely been an attack.

He waited until they took the little girl away, and the two other children found behind the school. Then he lit out for Genkai's.

****

Making their way to Genkai's proved to be an adventure. Being unseen and intangible meant they could shortcut through yards and businesses without causing a commotion – Kuwabara in particular was enjoying the ability to walk through any and every wall he came too. The trip was not without a few hassles, however. Small animals could see them, it seemed, or at least sense their passing, and for a couple of blocks they had a small following of cats, dogs and a particularly annoying ferret which had climbed out a window. The animals just followed them quietly, hackles up, until Kuwabara decided to scale the wall outside Sarayashiki Junior High for old time's sake. The animals were stopped at the wall and not being anxious to regain another following, Kuwabara and Kurama stuck to the streets from then on. They still attracted some attention, but the animals were content to hiss and growl warningly and let them pass.

Walking through _people_ was not as much fun as walking through walls. Kurama wasn't particularly affected by it, but Kuwabara's psychic abilities were always strongest when he was in physical contact with another person – and it appeared that being intangible didn't change that any. He managed to weave in and out of the crowds, avoiding most people. One older woman in particular made him turn an interesting shade of red and avoid Kurama's gaze for the rest of the trip. By the time they reached Genkai's Kuwabara was in a foul temper and nursing a headache.

The temple was warded heavily, a necessity considering the kind of enemies Genkai made. Demons, spirits, and even humans with evil intentions would find it difficult to climb the stairs. Some couldn't get past the wards at all.

"Will they let us through?" Kuwabara stood a few steps to the side, out of the range of the wards where his presence shouldn't be able to interfere with anything.

"The wards were set to recognize us and let us pass. I don't think having a body was ever specifically mentioned." Kurama braced himself and started up the stairs. He felt the wards against his skin – like a minor electric shock, but nothing worse than they always were. "It should be all right."

Climbing the stairs to the temple was like walking through a tunnel. The sound of people and cars faded behind them until, by the time they reached the temple itself, the sounds of the city had vanished altogether and you could almost forget it was just a few hundred meters away.

"Hiei's here," Kuwabara said irritably as they reached the top of the stairs. "Yuusuke, too. Think they know something's wrong already?"

"Possibly." Kurama doubted it, although there was always the chance. "Shizuru would know if something happened to you."

"If I were dead, yeah. But you seem pretty certain we aren't yet." It was said so matter of factly that Kurama had to shake his head. _Not yet._ Kuwabara ducked under a tree branch by force of habit and paused outside the door. "You think the Jagan will let Hiei see us?"

"I've considered that." The Jagan allowed Hiei to read minds and sense supernatural occurrences much in the way a human psychic could. But Hiei kept the Jagan warded and bound beneath a headband except when he specifically wished to use it. Even Kurama wasn't certain how much input the fire demon received from his third eye while it was warded. It was possible that the eye was as good as blind. "Genkai will probably be our best bet." He walked through the door of the temple, feeling the additional wards spark against his skin like an electric shock. He called over his shoulder. "These wards pack a little more of a kick than the last ones."

"I noticed." Kuwabara extricated himself from the door with a grimace and a shake of his head. "I'd never even _noticed_ these wards before."

"I think they're meant for wandering spirits," Kurama mused, hovering one insubstantial hand over the wood of the doorframe. "Ghosts. Evil entities."

"So we're wandering but not evil?"

"And not dead," Kurama reminded him. "I've been dead. This isn't it."

His partner studied him carefully for a minute, then nodded. "Not enough eyeliner to be dead."

Kurama leveled him with a steady glare, relieved despite himself to see Kuwabara crack a reluctant grin. "That joke will never grow old with you, will it?"

The human smirked and motioned for Kurama to proceed him into the temple. "Dead or not isn't the biggest problem right now anyway. Whatever did this to us is still out there. We need to figure out what it was, how it got out of the locket and whether or not we can put it back."

"Without anyone dying," Kurama finished grimly. "You said it was serpent-like?"

"And hungry. Don't forget hungry." Kuwabara paused outside the practice room door and stuch his head – literally – through the door. "I have a bad feeling I know what it eats, too."

"Souls?" Kurama guessed.

"I was thinking red-heads, actually," Kuwabara pulled his head back and jerked a thumb at the door. "Hiei looks like his puppy died. Not that he ever looks _happy_ or anything."

Kurama slid through the door into the practice room and raised a curious brow as he noticed the small group gathered within. On the far side of the room, Yuusuke and Genkai spoke quietly, Yuusuke leaning down, their voices hushed. They look concerned, which is to say that Genkai looked annoyed and Yuusuke looked bothered. Hiei stood across the room from them, directly across from the door, leaning against one wall with his hands in his pockets. He didn't react as Kurama entered the room.

"Hiei?" Kurama called, knowing he wouldn't get a response. The fire demon's gaze didn't even flicker.

Kuwabara pointed to his left. "If we're going to get Genkai's attention, now's the time." He slanted a sideways glance at Hiei, then leaned over Kurama's shoulder and poked a finger through Hiei's shoulder. He jerked back as if he expected the fire demon to explode, but Hiei didn't even flinch. A wicked smile curved over Kuwabara's face and he reached over again and poked another finger through Hiei's throat.

"If he finds out you're doing that, he'll unleash the black dragon on you," Kurama warned mildly.

The human paused. "Can the black dragon even hurt a bodiless, wandering-but-not-evil spirit?"

Not as far as Kurama knew, but he couldn't bring himself to admit it, knowing it would only encourage Kuwabara. "See if you can reach Genkai." He gave Hiei a tired glance, then deliberately turned toward Genkai and Yuusuke.

"I'm not very good at this," Kuwabara admitted reluctantly, as if Kurama needed to be told. "Hiei's the mind reader, not me."

Kurama waved that worry away. "We don't need to read her mind-"

"Thank god," Kuwabara interjected feelingly.

The youko gave him a rueful glance. "We just need to get her attention." He cast a doubtful glance at Hiei. "I'm surprised they haven't sensed our ki already. At the very least, Genkai should have sensed us when we set the wards off at the door. She wouldn't normally turn a blind eye to wandering spirits crawling through the temple. Even of the non-evil variety."

"They seem to have something else on their minds," Kuwabara said doubtfully. He crossed the room slowly, hesitantly, and Kurama thought that this must be how Kuwabara had once approached bank robbers and murderers. Of course, no human murderer would have been able to kill Kuwabara as easily as these two; this old woman and a middle school dropout. He paused at Yuusuke's side, and appeared to concentrate. "Yuusuke's worried about something. Us maybe, but not enough to really know what's happened. There's something else. An attack?" His eyes glazed over slightly as he reached further. "Something… something's hunting humans. Something's hurting humans. It touched Yuusuke." He shuddered and his eyes slid shut. "It's cold, Kurama. And hungry. Very hungry. It's been so long since it fed last."

"Kuwabara!" Kurama darted forward and grabbed at his partner as the taller man started to waver.

"Something's here." Genkai's voice crackled through the room, bringing Hiei and Yuusuke instantly to attention. She narrowed her eyes thoughtfully and stared straight through Kurama.

"Well, we got her attention." Kurama grunted as he caught most of Kuwabara's weight only to have it suddenly pulled away.

"It's here!" Kuwabara jerked free of Kurama's steadying grasp. "Kurama, get _down!_" He gripped the front of Kurama's shirt and shoved the youko away from him just as a blast of searing cold enveloped him. Kurama hit the ground and rolled to his feet as something flew past him and hit Yuusuke with a furious roar.

A wyrm. It was shockingly white and nearly transparent, with a thick, snake-like body. Wicked looking bone spikes lined along the top of the body, and the creature's jaw hung open to reveal jagged rows of teeth the size of Kurama's fingers. Nearly ten feet long, from the rounded, horned head to the point of the hook-shaped bone protrusion at the edge of the tail, the creature radiated cold in waves. "_That_ is what was in the locket?" he said disbelievingly.

Kuwabara grunted a wordless affirmative and staggered to his feet, looking more or less none the worse for wear. Behind him, Yuusuke was still on his feet and staring wildly around the room. "What the hell was-" Another roar drowned out the rest and Kuwabara flinched, but Yuusuke and the others didn't react at all.

"They don't hear it," Kurama realized. "They didn't even see it."

"Great," Kuwabara said darkly. "So we're on the same footing as the damn snake."

Kurama thought wildly. "If the wyrm is what pushed us out of our bodies, then it's fairly safe to assume that it pulled us into the same dimension of space that it occupies itself."

"Yay?" Kuwabara ventured.

"No, Kuwabara, that means we can hurt it!" Kurama thrust a hand out and sunk it deep into Yuusuke's chest. "They don't hear us, or feel us. We don't even exist to them. But if we were really ghosts, then they would have sensed us. Or Hiei's Jagan would have found us, or Genkai would have heard you when you called. Even Yuusuke's not totally insensitive. _One_ of them should have known we were here. We're not ghosts, our souls are in another plane, another dimension."

A thunderous roar drowned out whatever Kuwabara had to say to that, and the wyrm exploded through the back wall of the practice room. Genkai dodged cleanly out of the way, and Yuusuke, too late, threw both arms up in front of himself. The wyrm bared its fangs and screamed piercingly, but passed through Yuusuke without any visible effect.

"It can't hurt them!" Kuwabara's elation turned to tension as the wyrm turned toward him.

"It can hurt them," Kurama said quietly, "but not easily, not yet. If I'm right, it's not strong enough to hunt humans as powerful as Yuusuke and Genkai."

"What about humans as powerful as us?" Kuwabara asked warily.

Kurama smiled grimly. "I'm not human. But if we can reach it, then it's safe to assume it can reach us as well."

The wyrm reared its head and opened its jaws, throat muscles working. A piercing cry burst free, painfully loud. Kurama clapped both hands over his ears, even knowing it wouldn't help. "Kuwabara, move!" he called, hoping desperately the human would hear him over the screeching cry. He threw himself to his left, through the wall of the temple, and sunlight struck his eyes just before the ice-white color of the wyrm blocked out everything else. Still halfway through the undamaged temple wall, the creature lunged and snapped at him angrily, screaming in Kurama's face, but pulled up short as if something had caught it. Kurama reacted instinctively, summoning the rosewhip to hand. He flipped himself backwards, landing on his feet, facing the wyrm, which continued to strain against what held it.

"Any day now, Kurama!" Kuwabara shouted from somewhere still inside the temple.

The whip lashed out, striking across the wyrm's head and face nearly a dozen times. Pale blue lines appeared across the flesh where the whip had struck, and as Kurama watched, translucent liquid began to drip from the lacerations.

"So," Kurama said, quietly pleased. "I was right. You can be hurt." The fact that the creature appeared to be suffering only minor scratches from an attack that had cut Genbu to pieces and killed hundreds of other demons was something to worry about at another time. The fact that it could be hurt was good enough to start with. He flicked his wrist and the whip wrapped around the wyrm's neck.

The wyrm reared back, pulling Kurama off his feet as the creature strained against the whip. Kurama let go just as the wyrm lashed its head violently from side to side. The whip slapped through the walls of the temple and came loose. Kurama called it back to his hand even as the wyrm slammed its head into the ground and appeared to heave. From inside the temple came a vaguely panicked shout, then the bone tip of the wyrm's tail appeared through the roof of the temple.

****

"Any day now, Kurama!"

The snake's tail heaved in his grasp, trying to knock him loose so it could continue its pursuit of the youko. Kuwabara set his feet a little farther apart and tightened his hold, hoping this thing was as killable as Kurama seemed to think. It wasn't the biggest demon they'd ever fought – by a long shot – but it was stronger than it looked. Kuwabara had a bad feeling that if it was allowed to feed it would become a lot stronger than it already was.

Hiei had joined the party and Kuwabara slid a glance sideways to see how they were reacting to all the unexplained excitement. Hiei had removed the wards covering the Jagan, which glowed bright violet as it examined the scene before him. No sign of recognition crossed Hiei's face, but he obviously knew that something was there. Genkai stood with her arms crossed and her brow furrowed, just a few inches away from the beast, and the way she occasionally took a step back when the thrashing increased gave Kuwabara hope she could at least sense it better than the others – although the cold this thing was putting out would probably be enough to alert her to its general location. He tried not to think about the ice-cold flesh beneath his arms. Already his hands ached from the bitter chill.

Yuusuke looked chilled, rubbing his arms absently as he surveyed the scene. The creature had crashed through him twice, trying to attack, or to feed, and he was definitely feeling the cold, even if the creature itself was intangible to him.

"All right then, we got their attention," he muttered. "Not how we planned, maybe, but never let it be said the K&K Detective Agency can't improvise." Then, knowing that two of the most powerful people in the world, and Hiei, were standing just a few feet away, trying to see or hear anything, he did something just a little bit drastic.

He really wasn't any good at this mind reading stuff, a fact which Kurama had tactfully not agreed with him on earlier. Hiei was a mind reader. Kuwabara's psychic abilities, on the other hand, tended to be more of the cold flash and vague premonitions of doom variety, which weren't terribly impressive all by themselves. When a psychic was needed, they usually turned to the fire demon – or Kuwabara's sister, Shizuru, who managed to be a lot more impressive with only a little more skill. Shizuru's vague impressions of doom usually at least came with a time and a place, while Kuwabara was limited to "well, I see a lot of blood somewhere. Not sure whose it is, really."

But he was good enough to talk mind to mind when the person he was reaching out to was also sensitive. It let him communicate with Kurama on cases, and he was fairly certain it would let him reach Genkai now that she was trying to reach back. A grim smile twisted his lips as the snake heaved suddenly and seemed to rear up. Even if she thought she was reaching out to a demon of some kind.

_Genkai_, he projected as focused and intently as he could. He gathered up every piece of sensation at hand, the feel of the creature's flesh beneath cold-numbed hands, the residual ache from the door wards, even the throbbing pulse of the headache he'd been nursing since he woke up. Then he wrapped it up in his need to talk to her, and _shoved_ in her direction.

The snake's tail whipped to the side and distracted just briefly by his attempt to reach Genkai, Kuwabara lost his footing and was pulled into the air. The tail snapped again, and he lost his grip, flying back through the wall of the temple with a startled shout.

He passed through the wall easily, but hitting the ground hurt as much as it ever had. He sucked in air instinctively and rolled with it, coming up onto hands and knees. He shook his head and found himself staring into Genkai's eyes. Piercing black eyes bored directly through him. Kuwabara swallowed and tried to remind himself that he'd been too old to be grounded for several years now.

_Not that it matters. Genkai's more the type to slam your head into a wall anyway._

Yuusuke appeared over her shoulder, staring grimly – probably trying to look intimidating, but the effect was somewhat ruined by the fact that he couldn't actually _see_ anything. His glare was aimed somewhere over Kuwabara's left shoulder and was surely intimidating the chlorophyll out of the grass.

"Who are you?" Genkai demanded in a gravelly voice. "Is that creature here because of you?"

_Well, technically…_ Kuwabara grimaced and tried to push that thought far, far away from the front of his mind. _+Genkai?+_

Her brow furrowed slightly, but otherwise showed no reaction.

_+Genkai,+ _he thought with feeling, +_we have a problem.+_

Recognition dawned in her eyes as the wyrm reared into the air behind her, Kurama's rose whip dangling from its mouth. Genkai must have sensed its presence because she turned away, leaving Kuwabara free to scramble to his feet without fear of being flattened by a spirit wave.

The creature roared and flailed at the air, the rose whip flying away as it bellowed. Kuwabara could see pale blue liquid dripping from the creature's mouth and face. Blood. Kurama had managed to hurt it, then. "Kurama, you alive over there?"

His partner's form materialized through the temple wall and nearly stumbled through Hiei as the fire demon appeared at Genkai's side. "It can be hurt," the youko said grimly. "That's the good news."

"The bad news?

"I'm pretty sure it can hurt us."

Kuwabara nodded. "That would be pretty bad."

"I have an idea," Kurama said as he ran past. "But it's going to be a close one. We need to go back to the warehouse."

"What about them?" Kuwabara demanded, jerking his head toward their corporeal and largely oblivious friends.

"It can't hurt them yet, remember?"

Kuwabara relaxed slightly and started after Kurama in a slow jog.

"Besides," the youko added. "I'm pretty certain I made it mad."

Kuwabara glared at the back of Kurama's head, but ran faster. "Oh, you think you're _funny_-"

An ear splitting shriek rent the air behind them, and a blast of cold air struck them like an arctic gale.

"-but you're not," Kuwabara said fervently.

Kurama didn't bother following the street – he hit the bottom of the staircase and kept running through the brick wall and into an alley. Kuwabara couldn't help but brace himself before he followed through the wall, but the chill creeping through his limbs warned him not to hesitate too long. The wyrm was now following them, and if it couldn't hurt their friends, it _could _hurt normal humans.

And them. It could hurt them, which Kuwabara felt was worth remembering.

"Stay off the streets," Kurama said flatly. "We go the back routes – it'll follow us, hopefully. Either of us would be a bigger meal than any hundred humans put together."

"If we're lucky," Kuwabara said grimly, "it won't stop to snack."

Kurama nodded. "Exactly."

"Why are we going to the warehouse?"

"To find out what Hiroshi did with your body."

****

Hiei stood at the top of the stone steps until he felt the entity move on, then slowly warded the Jagan again. He knotted the headband slowly and meticulously, every move precise, because otherwise he was convinced his hands would shake.

"Any time someone wants to chime in with an explanation of what the hell that was all about, would be fine by me." Urameshi sounded angry, but that was normal when he didn't know what the situation was. Hiei wasn't sure himself, but he had a feeling Genkai did.

"There was more than one entity here," he said definitively. "There were _three_."

Genkai nodded. "I felt the first two when they tripped my wards. But they were non-malevolent, so I overlooked them. A misjudgement."

"Ghosts," Hiei said.

"That was a _ghost_?" Urameshi cast a doubtful look over his shoulder. "Of _what_? A really pissed off whale?"

"A wyrm, actually." Yukina peered around the doorframe of the temple and stared thoughtfully down the steps.

Urameshi opened his mouth to say something stupid, but shut it when Hiei glared at him.

Genkai crossed her arms. "Are you certain, Yukina?"

The girl nodded. "Yes, Genkai-shihan. I've seen them before, although much smaller. This one was very weak, though. It's been starved."

Hiei frowned. "A starving ice beast is marauding around this temple?"

"That just doesn't sound good," Urameshi groaned.

"It gets better," Genkai said with a grim pleasure that Hiei found unsettling. "Since none of us can properly sense the creature, it could conceivably return at any time."

"That's what attacked those kids," Urameshi said quietly. "That worm. It killed those little kids."

Yukina gasped in horror, clasping her hands over her mouth in shock.

Genkai nodded. "Yes."

"The ghosts," Hiei said. "It killed them as well?" Something in his voice must have given him away. Urameshi and Yukina both glanced his way. Hiei focused on Genkai, blocking out the other two.

The old woman chuckled. "You sensed Kuwabara as well, then? I couldn't place the other one, but I assumed it was Kurama."

"_What?_"

"Genkai-shihan!"

"It was Kurama," Hiei confirmed. "I recognized him."

"Excuse me," Yuusuke said harshly, his youki flaring dangerously. "Can we go back to the part where you said Kuwabara and Kurama were _dead_?"

"They're not dead," Genkai said flatly. "Yet. But the beast was following them when they left, so I doubt they have much longer. Yuusuke, Hiei, find out where those two were and what they were doing that they've screwed up this badly. Find their bodies. Yukina, I'll need your help." She glared at the temple. "And somebody light a fire."

****

Yuusuke bounced on the balls of his feet, resisting the urge to move while Hiei concentrated. "I know you're home, Shizuru. I can feel you ignoring me. Answer the phone." He squinted into the wind and stared at the back of Hiei's head, urging him to concentrate _faster_ already. "Shizuru, we think your idiot brother's gone and pissed off something very big and very hungry. You're the only one who knows where he was supposed to be this morning-"

"_Last night._"

"Shizuru, wow. Glad to know that it only takes a life or death situation to get your attention." Yuusuke gripped the cell phone a little too tightly and heard an ominous cracking sound. "What do you mean, 'last night'?"

"_I mean, he was supposed to be somewhere last night. He and Kurama were meeting someone. As far as I can tell, neither one's been back here since._" Kuwabara's sister sounded annoyed, but that was probably just from having to talk to Yuusuke.

"You're at the office?" Yuusuke covered cell phone with his hand. "Hiei – think we should head for the office? Maybe the psychic trail will be stronger there?"

The fire demon gave him a condescending look. "I am not a bloodhound."

Yuusuke rolled his eyes and spoke into the cell phone. "Shizuru, can you find out where they were supposed to go?"

A disbelieving snort came through loud and clear. "_Not even my idiot brother keeps notes about secret midnight meetings with criminal informers, Urameshi._"

"What about Kurama?"

There was a pause and Shizuru chuckled. "_Yeah, he probably would_."

"Check their office, see if they left anything. Don't they have, like, casefiles or something?" Yuusuke glared at the trunk of the tree, then tipped his head back to glare at Hiei, perched in the topmost branches. "They wouldn't just take off into a dangerous situation without telling someone."

"_Since when?_" Shizuru retorted. "_I can name a half dozen instances off the top of my head._"

There was a rustle in the branches above his head and Yuusuke jumped to the side just in time to avoid having Hiei land on his head. The fire demon smirked, and Yuusuke swore that the Jagan brightened slightly. "The creature is heading toward the water," Hiei said.

"What's at the water?" Yuusuke asked. He gazed at the horizon, narrowing his eyes against the breeze.

The look on Hiei's face said elegantly that he didn't know and would never be bothered to find out.

"_Warehouses_," Shizuru said. "_The old warehouse district just before you hit the waterfront. Their main informant works out of there. They may have been there to set up a meeting._"

Yuusuke cast Hiei a sideways glance. It sounded as likely as anything else. With a gesture, Yuusuke sent Hiei ahead, then followed.

"What's his name?" Yuusuke asked, shielding the mouthpiece of the phone so the air rushing past wouldn't interfere too badly with what they were saying.

"_Hiroshi_."

Yuusuke frowned. "The handcuffs guy? They still _work_ with him?"

He could hear Shizuru rifling through papers and shoving things around. "_They were hired to find a locket,_" she finally said. "_According to this, it may have been haunted._"

"By a giant, man-eating, ice whale?" Yuusuke guessed.

"_No. By someone's little old grandmother. Apparently._"

Yuusuke grimaced. "Well, Granny's got a stick up her ass now. Call if you find anything else, Shizuru. Otherwise, we'll meet you back at Genkai's." He snapped the phone shut before she could respond and focused on keeping up with Hiei.

The warehouses came into sight ahead, a row of square, concrete buildings like children's blocks. Largely unused if not actively abandoned, this was a part of the city that had seen better days. Those that weren't boarded up had seen better days.

Hiei paused briefly on the roof of an old construction warehouse, plastered with faded government logos and scanned the area before taking off again. The warehouse he settled on was still and silent, surrounded by a small amount of grass and one stubborn tree. Yuusuke was about to ask him if he was certain when he noticed the windows were frosting over.

"They're in here," Hiei said.

****

Kurama's plan had been a good one, right up till the part where they couldn't actually outrun the damn thing for very long. They'd made it to the warehouse with only one or two minor mishaps - he couldn't help but press a hand against his chest, where the wyrm had caught him a glancing blow with its tail. Technically there were no bones for it to break, but he'd had his ribs broken before and that's what it _felt_ like - but now the damned thing had them more or less cornered.

The wyrm lunged through the air, unsettlingly fast for something as large as it was, and snapped at Kurama with gleaming fangs. The youko dodged neatly, and lashed out with the rosewhip. The wyrm caught a mouthful of thorns and screeched in pain, blue blood dripping from the edges of its mouth as it flopped away from Kurama and put itself directly in the path of Kuwabara's charge.

The reiken flickered to life in his palm; solidified reiki that was reassuringly warm compared the oppressive cold that was slowly seeping off the wyrm. He pushed off against the concrete floor and leapt at the wyrm, catching it head-on and driving the reiken into the skin along the side of its neck. He drove his weight against that spot and pulled, dragging the sword through the creature's side and tearing a gash nearly two feet long down its side. Ice-cold blood pumped from the wound, coating his hands.

"Shit!" He hit the floor hard and rolled into a crouch, distracted by the sudden pain in his hands and clenched his fists against his thighs. "Don't let it bleed on you!" he shouted over his shoulder, flexing his hands and hissing slowly through his teeth.

Kurama dropped out of the air in front of him, the rosewhip coiled around his fist. "Are you all right?"

"I'll live."

"We need to find our bodies," Kurama said urgently. "The locket is our best bet for stopping this thing. If we can reseal it-"

"Assuming it's still _with_ our bodies. What if Hiroshi made off with the damned thing?"

"One disaster at a time, Kuwabara-kun."

Kuwabara sensed movement behind him and shoved himself to the side, Kurama jumping neatly along with him as the wyrm hurtled past. Its momentum took it through the warehouse wall and they could hear it bellow in fury before it turned itself and lunged back inside.

They instinctively moved to flank it, Kurama catching it with the rosewhip around the head. The wyrm heaved but Kurama used the momentum to hold it in place. It would only work for a moment, but that's all Kuwabara needed to hurt it again. The reiken sunk into the wyrm's eye nearly up to his hands, but he pulled back before he the blood spilling out of the wound could come into contact with his skin. The wyrm's scream this time was as much in pain as in anger and it lashed blindly, the hook shaped spine at the end of its tail nearly decapitating him as he dodged frantically out of the way. Distracted by the tail, he didn't realize until it was too late that the wyrm had turned to stare at him with its one good eye.

"Kuwabara!"

A blast of ice seared through his skin and knocked him against the floor. For a long moment all he could feel was cold, his skin tight and brittle, his breath frozen in his throat. Then the world kicked back in around him and he shuddered as he tried to climb to his feet. Summoning the reiken was taking more effort and concentration every time he did it, and he had a nasty feeling that if he tried to use too much reiki while dispossessed of his body, he'd end up regretting it. The ice had taken too much out of him - he couldn't afford to get caught like that again.

Kurama was attacking again, something sharp and wicked-looking in his left hand. He leapt over the wyrm, tucked into a roll and came down facing the creature, dragging the spear down the back of it. He hit the floor and immediately leapt again, putting himself out of range of any retaliation. "I'll distract it," he called. "You see you can find what Hiroshi did with our bodies. He can't have dragged them very far."

There were several things wrong with that idea, and Kuwabara was all set to list them, in alphabetical order, when the door at the front of the warehouse was pulled open and nearly off its hinges. He paused, glancing toward the door and saw Urameshi peering into the room. He rubbed his arms. "Hoo boy, that's cold."

Kuwabara resisted the urge to kick him in the head, but only because he knew Urameshi wouldn't feel it.

"Change of plan," Kurama said tightly, his voice barely audible over the sudden whining cry the wyrm was making. "We distract it and _they _go looking for our bodies."

Kuwabara didn't really like that plan either, but he could see they were running out of options. "All right. But if this thing eats me I'm going to blame you."

"I think I can deal with that."

****

+_Hiei!_+

"They're here," Hiei said finally, his jagan providing an eerie aura to the empty warehouse.

+_Hiei! We need the locket!_+

Hiei paused, trying to ignore the feeling creeping down his spine. There was something large and evil and very powerful nearby, and his youki was screaming in his veins. "Did Shizuru say anything about a locket?"

Urameshi nodded. "Shizuru figures they were down here to get it back or something."

+_HIEI!_+

"Bodies," Hiei snapped. He flung an arm out to stop Urameshi from advancing any further. "Where are their bodies?"

Urameshi paused, muscled tight with the barely repressed instinct to fight. "Their - you mean their bodies are just lying around somewhere?"

Hiei had turned his attention from the invisible battle before them and was scanning the warehouse with his jagan. "What did you think?"

"I don't know. That he ate them or something. I haven't really had a lot of time to formulate a theory or anything you-"

+_Ooh, big words, Urameshi. Obviously the Word-A-Day calendar Keiko got you for Christmas is paying off.+_

"-know." Yuusuke blinked. "Did you hear that?"

"No."

"Oh. Good." Yuusuke felt a rush of cold air at his back and took a big step forward. "So it didn't eat them?"

Hiei was crossing the open space of the warehouse at a steady, precise pace, apparently oblivious to what was happening around him. "It's a soul devourer," he said. "But it's weakened by its captivity."

"Yeah? So? It ate those kids all right." He stared at the back of Hiei's head. "Or are they wandering around here somewhere, too?"

"No, they're dead," the fire demon said flatly. He glanced around quickly, then pushed on toward the back door.

"But Kurama and Kuwabara aren't?" Yuusuke persisted. Somewhere to his left a whirlwind of reiki was forming. It was familiar, though normally there was a lot more of it. "I'm just making sure here."

"They aren't. Yet. The wyrm was too weak to successfully overwhelm such powerful adversaries. They resisted - albeit not entirely successfully," Hiei added scornfully. "They are still in danger, though. The soul can't survive long parted from its body - as you learned yourself."

Yuusuke froze. "Wait. Wait, wait, wait."

Hiei spared him a backwards glance as he kicked the door open. "No, Yuusuke, you won't have to kiss anyone."

"Oh, thank God."

Behind the warehouse was an alley, boasting a dumpster that didn't seem to have been emptied in several years and more rats that Yuusuke had ever seen in one place in his entire life. Hiei's sudden entrance had sent literally dozens of them running, chittering and screeching as they vanished into the shadows. Several more raced past them into the warehouse, scrambling over Yuusuke's feet. "Oh, gross!" Yuusuke hopped backwards on one leg, trying shake off one that had started chewing on his shoelaces.

Hiei had unsheathed his katana at some point and stalked toward the dumpster. More rats spilled out of the dumpster and from underneath it, startled by the demon's presence, and by the flickers of youki that were spilling off of him.

"Tell me we're not going dumpster diving, Hiei." Yuusuke glared at a rat perched atop a trashcan and smirked when it fled.

The fire demon jumped up to perch on the edge of the dumpster and peered into the refuse with a critical eye. His Jagan gleamed slightly, then Hiei was digging through the piles of trash.

"What are you _looking_ for?" Yuusuke demanded. "The locket? Wouldn't the jewel thief have that?"

"No," Hiei said. "Kuwabara took it from him before the wyrm broke free."

Yuusuke glanced at the last few rats, then at the rapidly emptying dumpster. "You mean-" He grabbed the side of the dumpster and hauled himself onto the rim.

At the bottom of the dumpster, covered in rotting fruit skins and old chewed-up papers, half-covered by a torn blue tarp, lay Kuwabara and Kurama's bodies. A few more determined rats remained in the bottom of the dumpster and Yuusuke took a vicious swipe at them as one bit into the back of Kuwabara's hand. He wound his fingers into the front of Kuwabara's shirt and hauled, heaving the human out of the remaining piles of trash, and manhandling him over the side of the dumpster. He nearly lost his balance - _Fuck_, _Kuwabara's a heavy son-of-a-bitch _- but he managed to lower himself and the other man to the ground in one piece. Yuusuke gave him a quick once-over, but aside from some bite marks he looked unharmed. "He's breathing," he said in surprise, and splayed his fingers across Kuwabara's chest to feel for a heartbeat.

Hiei jumped lightly to the ground beside him, Kurama's inanimate form in his arms. "The locket," the fire demon snapped. "He should have it on him somewhere."

Yuusuke's eyes were drawn to Kuwabara's left fist, clenched so tightly the knuckles were bright white. Yuusuke tried to pry the fingers apart. "Couldn't just put it in your pocket, could you?"

From inside the warehouse, something roared.

Yuusuke paused. "What was that?"

"The creature is getting stronger." Hiei gave Kurama a concerned glance. "And since the only thing around here for it to feed on is them-"

"We need to hurry." No time to be delicate. Yuusuke offered Kuwabara a mental apology and pried his fist open, wincing slightly at the sound of snapping bones. "We're going to blame this on whoever dumped them in here, right?"

On Kuwabara's palm, bright against the black gloves he was wearing, lay a small silver locket and chain. Hiei shifted Kurama's weight so the youko was resting against him, supported by one arm, and reached for the locket, holding it gingerly between two fingers as he examined it. "The locket itself is heavily warded," he said thoughtfully. "A binding ward of some caliber. Very powerful, but not terribly sophisticated. There's even a secondary ward to drain the creature's life force."

"So if this setup is so impressive, how did the thing get _out_?" Yuusuke wondered.

"The idiot probably tripped the wards," Hiei said scornfully.

The warehouse shook with another of the wyrm's angry howls and in Hiei's arms, Kurama's body shuddered deeply and stopped breathing.

****

"Kurama!" Kuwabara ducked a blow from the wyrm's tail and vaulted over the creature's body. It was becoming darker and less transparent as the battle went on, and when Kurama fell the creature roared triumphantly. Kuwabara didn't know exactly how much energy it would take for the wyrm to regain its full strength, but he suspected they were rapidly approaching that point.

The wyrm howled again, lashing its tail against the side of the warehouse. Instead of passing through, the tail slammed into the wall with a loud crash, cracking plaster and leaving an indentation roughly the size of a small car.

_That isn't good._

He reached down to Kurama, intending to pull his partner away from the wyrm, stash him somewhere until they could beat this thing, but his hand passed straight through Kurama's shoulder.

_Panicking is out,_ Kuwabara told himself firmly. _There will be no panicking_.

The wyrm reared up and this time its head slammed into the ceiling, eliciting another furious roar. It glared down at Kuwabara and exhaled a long stream of white frost. The thin layer of ice settled over Kuwabara and Kurama, unnaturally cold and stealing the warmth from Kuwabara's skin. He took a deep breath, but the air around him was freezing cold.

The wyrm was about to attack, and Kurama was helpless. Kuwabara cast a grim look over his shoulder toward the direction Hiei and Yuusuke had taken, but held little hope that they'd return this quickly.

_+Hiei_,+ he projected with a fatalistic air, +_you'd better find that fucking locket_.+

He felt Hiei's startled reaction somewhere in the back of his mind. Then he charged the wyrm.

****

Hiei realized what the idiot was planning a second before he did it.

"He's going to get himself killed," he snarled, clutching the locket. "Bring him. Now." He slung Kurama's body over his shoulder and raced back into the warehouse.

The ice wyrm was visible now, although if Hiei concentrated with his Jagan he could still make out hints of etherealness around the edges. The wyrm was not quite at full strength yet. But it had obviously been gorging itself while they were distracted.

"That's your worm?" Yuusuke demanded, sounding ridiculously outraged. "That's not a worm! That's a fucking _subway car_."

Sometimes Hiei just did not understand the human thought process.

The wyrm was focused on a particular point, spewing ice through the air. Hiei couldn't see anything, but he didn't expect to.

"Draw its attention." Hiei set Kurama's body down against the wall of the warehouse. Yuusuke dropped the idiot beside him.

"Why do I get to be bait?" the human demanded.

"Do you know how to cast a binding spell?"

"I'm going to go be bait."

The wyrm sensed their presence - it would have to be dead not to, Hiei mused, since Urameshi was putting off enough youki to choke ten of the creatures - and screamed a challenge before flinging itself at Yuusuke. The half-blood countered the attack in his usual way - he flipped the creature off, then kicked it in the face.

Since Urameshi seemed to have the situation in hand for the moment, Hiei focused on the jewelry he still held clenched in his palm.

The locket itself was simple and plain, although probably valuable. It looked to be made of real silver, which probably had helped the original spellcaster. Lesser metals didn't hold magic as easily, except for steel and iron. The chain was unimportant and Hiei dismissed it from his examinations. Probing carefully with his third eye he concentrated on the spell pattern, tracing the binding spells and wards, which had originally held the wyrm in captivity. Four wards were worked into the metal of the locket. One was a binding spell, obviously meant to bind the wyrm to the locket, a second drained the creature's life-force as long as it was imprisoned. The third was a simple locking ward, to keep the locket from opening accidentally. The fourth, though, was troublesome. It seemed to be a release spell of some sort. The pattern was simple and effective, though somewhat... inexperienced. Hiei doubted that whatever human had originally cast the spell had much training. Hiei examined it further, and the pattern fell away.

A retrieval spell. Set so that the ward could be set aside and recast at will without having to be rewoven. Whoever had originally bound the wyrm meant to release it and call it back like a falcon to its perch. Or, Hiei realized, like a hunting dog. A small application of reiki would be enough to trip the wards, which probably explained how it had been set loose in the first place - there was no sub-spell for specific reiki signatures, or psychic impressions. Whoever the spellcaster had been, they didn't seem to have realized that anyone else with even a modicum of power could mimic their efforts.

Whatever the human who originally cast those spells had intended, their ambition had served Hiei well. The retrieval spell would make it far easier to re-bind the wyrm. All they would need was reiki.

Of which Hiei had none.

Across the warehouse, Urameshi had hurled himself against the wyrm and was busy trying to crush it against the wall, but even at a distance, Hiei could see the increasing paleness of Urameshi's skin. The cold pouring off the creature was growing exponentially, and as he watched, it blasted Yuusuke with a stream of ice.

Hiei wondered if his hellfire would be more effective against the ice wyrm than Urameshi's brute strength, but abandoned the thought almost immediately. The half-demon had no talent with the arcane, and even something as simple as this retrieval ward would require a moment for him to assess. They didn't have that time.

He scanned the warehouse, concentrating on the spot the wyrm had been prepared to attack when they entered, searching for a hint of familiar reiki, or psychic impression.

+_Kuwabara, stop fooling around and take this_.+

****

Crouched on the floor of the warehouse, frozen through the bone, lungs seizing from the cold, Kuwabara found the strength to glare at the fire demon. +_Fooling around?_+ he managed to project, although the effort it took was nearly staggering. It probably would have been, actually, if he'd been standing.

Hiei heard him; the fire demon was staring around the warehouse with a piercing gaze, and his Jagan was still wide open. Kuwabara realized he'd never seen the fire demon use his third eye for so long at once. He entertained a brief, vicious hope that it was giving the little runt a headache.

He pulled himself to his feet, his vision blurring and fading as he moved, his head pounding. His limbs were frozen logs, nearly insensate and almost entirely beyond his control. The cold was sapping what little strength he had. "Kurama," he gasped.

His partner was where he had left him, curled on and halfway through the floor. His legs and his right arm were slowly sinking through the floor, and Kuwabara could no longer reach him to pull him back. The fox demon was dying a few feet away, and he couldn't even get to him.

"Kuwabara!" Hiei was shouting now. "Kuwabara, the locket will only respond to reiki!"

_The locket?_ Kuwabara turned his head to glance at Hiei, his head spinning with the effort. The wyrm had come out of the locket. Hiei had the locket. The wyrm- was trying to eat Urameshi on the other side of the building and was ignoring them for the moment.

+_Give me_,+ Kuwabara focused on Hiei, and forcing himself to cross the half dozen feet between them, but the air was as thick as water and pushing himself through it took energy he didn't have.

Hiei thrust the locket out in his general direction, dangling from its chain. Kuwabara cupped his hands under it, and concentrated on the last of his reiki. A flicker of orange glinted off the silver as the locket snapped open and he vaguely noticed Hiei's eyes widen slightly, but there was something changing in the locket, a pulling that set off his sixth sense, and it distracted him.

He didn't even feel it when the wyrm slammed through him as it was pulled back into the locket.

****

Hiei could no longer hear Kuwabara, if the human was even trying to communicate, but he felt the spark of the human's reiki in front of him, saw it reflected off the metal of the locket. Then the wyrm let out a furious bellow and abandoned Urameshi to barrel headlong toward the fire demon.

Hiei had only a moment to brace himself before the creature was on him, a blizzard of snow and ice and arctic winds that buffeted him on all sides. He grit his teeth against the cold and held the open locket out in front of him. The wyrm screeched in fury, and vanished in a cloud of ice that hung in the air around him before slowly fading. He pressed the locket shut, and even the lingering traces of the creature faded completely.

"That was almost easy," Urameshi said breathlessly, rubbing his arms as he jogged slowly to stand over Kurama and Kuwabara's bodies. "Is that thing really trapped now?"

"As long as no one does anything stupid," Hiei said scornfully. "We should get rid of it. It's too big a risk to leave it lingering in the human world."

"What about Kurama and Kuwabara?" Urameshi asked. "Can they go back to their bodies now?"

"I don't know." Hiei forced himself to focus the jagan, ignoring the spikes of pain it sent crashing through his skull. "It was hard to sense them before, but now it's nearly impossible."

"Kurama stopped breathing a while ago," Urameshi said tightly. "Even his body needs oxygen."

"If they were dead I'd have sensed it," Hiei told him. He curled his fingers around the locket and stared at his fist for a moment while he concentrated. "But their ki was sapped fighting the creature. And without their bodies, they've no way to restore it."

Urameshi's voice was tight with frustration. "Can we take them to Genkai's?"

Hiei slid the locket into the inner pocket of his cloak and turned to face the two still forms propped against the wall, Urameshi a fidgeting sentry above them. "She may know something we don't," he admitted.

That drew a snort from Urameshi. "The old hag? She probably…" Urameshi trailed off slowly as he glanced down at the bodies of their teammates. "Kuwabara?"

Hiei tensed. "What is it?"

Urameshi dropped to a crouch, a stricken look on his face. "He's not breathing anymore."

****

Humans need to breathe. Hell, even demons need to breathe, although some could get by with less than others. But humans were a bit less flexible about the little things like oxygen and blood flow to the brain. Kurama's messed-up body might not need to breathe frequently anymore, but last time Yuusuke checked, Kuwabara was still pretty hung up on the whole "inhale/exhale" process.

So this was not a good sign.

"Their souls are too far removed from their bodies," Hiei was saying somewhere to his right, using the clinical voice that he always dragged out when he was pretending he wasn't interested in what they were talking about. It was how he talked about Yukina. "The breathing instinct and heartbeat are probably the last functions that held out."

"We have to do something," Yuusuke said flatly

"Genkai-"

"Too long. Kuwabara can't afford brain damage. He's barely passing for functional these days anyway." The insult was habit. The lack of furious retort was not. "You said their ki was gone? Used up fighting that worm-thing?"

Hiei made an affirmative sound.

"So they just need a jumpstart, right?" Yuusuke cracked the knuckles in his right hand. "If they had enough ki, they could come back to their bodies?"

"What are you thinking, Yuusuke?"

"Are they still here? Their souls? You said you could still sense them."

Hiei hesitated. "Yes."

"Tell them to get ready." Yuusuke focused his ki, letting the reiki spill through his blood, pushing the youki back. "I'm going to give Kuwabara a jumpstart." He focused it in his palm, a sphere of pale blue energy held barely between the tips of his fingers. He pushed down and the sphere slid through Kuwabara's chest. The body convulsed once, and Yuusuke snarled through his teeth. "All right, you fucker." He dispersed the reiki, felt it leave him it sank into the other man's body. Beneath his hand, he felt Kuwabara's heart thud once, weakly, then stop again.

"You absolute _shithead_-"

A second thud. A third. His chest expanded, dragging in breath only to cough hoarsely. He sucked in another lungful of air, easier this time, and another. Beneath Yuusuke's hand, his heart was pounding double-time.

"Kuwabara?"

The human twisted away from Yuusuke's touch, eyes flying open as he rolled over and pushed himself to his hands and knees. He glanced around quickly, settled on Kurama's unmoving form, and lunged across Yuusuke.

Yuusuke scrambled out of the way. "Kuwabara?"

Reiki flared in Kuwabara's palm as he reached for the fox demon. The energy dissipated into the still form, and they all held their breath as Kuwabara hunched over his partner's form, slowly getting his breath back.

Kurama stirred slowly, and Yuusuke whooped - even Hiei looked relieved. He was pale and shivering slightly, but he blinked up at them and sucked in a deep breath.

"I told you," Kuwabara's voice was rough and he slumped forward with visible exhaustion. "We need to start charging more."

****

"Am I still on Kuwabara's shit list?"

Kurama looked away form his coffee long enough to give Yuusuke a tired look. "He's not mad at you."

Yuusuke leaned in the doorway to Kurama's office and crossed his arms. "Then I have definitely lost my touch, because I've been trying to piss him off for _days_."

He had been, and under other circumstances it would have been fun to watch. Kurama had seen them like this before, but never with the increasing air of frustration on Yuusuke's part. Even at his best, Kuwabara had never managed to ignore the half-demon so thoroughly in the past. And Kuwabara certainly wasn't at his best.

"Don't take it personally," Kurama finally said.

Yuusuke flopped down in Kuwabara's chair, spinning himself in lazy circles. "I shouldn't have told him about the kids."

"You didn't know he was the one who triggered the locket," Kurama said, turning the page of his magazine, "and even if you had, he would have been furious at you for hiding such a thing."

Yuusuke slouched in his chair. His air was in his eyes but he didn't seem to notice. "It wasn't his fault."

"No," Kurama agreed quietly. "But it was his responsibility. And mine. And we've both accepted that. Give him time to process it, Yuusuke. Three children are dead because of something we did. Kuwabara is not the sort of man who can shrug such a burden off." He smiled at Yuusuke and added slyly, "You would not care so much for him if he was such a man."

Yuusuke glared at him from under his hair. "You aren't going to make me knock your lights out, are you? I don't like beating up on people weaker than me."

"Kuwabara says differently," Kurama replied, but he grinned as he said it. "And my youki is replenishing nicely. Perhaps you'd like to see for yourself just how much weaker than you I really am."

His youki had been drained entirely when they revived him in his body at the warehouse. Yuusuke and Hiei had somehow gotten the two of them back to their own house and deposited them in their own beds. Kurama had woken fourteen hours later to find himself fully dressed with a blanket thrown over him, Kuwabara snoring in the next room, and Yuusuke helping himself to the contents of their fridge while watching pay-per-view fights on cable. Hiei had taken off once he was certain they weren't going to fade away any time soon and Shizuru had used their exhaustion as an excuse for a paid day off. Kurama had taken the remote away from a pouting Yuusuke, turned down the volume, and promptly fallen asleep on the couch while two American wrestlers beat each other with metal folding chairs. The next time he woke up Kuwabara had been out in the backyard, Yuusuke had been standing by the window with his fists clenched and a sick look on his face and the air had been thick with tension and grief.

"His reiki isn't recharging like it should," Yuusuke said.

"Grief and guilt will do that. Negative emotions feed on spiritual strength, you know that." He found himself putting a bit more emphasis on that last part than he had intended to and offered Yuusuke an apologetic smile. "I didn't mean that the way it sounded."

Yuusuke waved him off. "It's true enough, I guess. We were all lucky nothing tried to kill us after you died. Or after you came back."

Kurama nodded. The unfortunate circumstances of his resurrection – such as it was – had been nearly as hard on his friends as his death, robbing them of their hopes that he had at least found some measure of peace in the afterlife or reincarnation. "Yuusuke, lots of things tried to kill you after I came back."

"Yes, but that was your fault."

He laughed softly, letting the feeling rumble in his chest for a moment. "I can't argue with that."

"You can argue with anything," Yuusuke retorted, "you just don't make it look like arguing."

"Unlike you," Kuwabara said from the doorway, "who can make even a casual hello sound like a call to arms."

Yuusuke jumped in his chair and spun around to face the door. "_Stop sneaking up on me_."

Kuwabara arched an eyebrow. "Kurama? Was I sneaking?"

"No," Kurama replied dutifully. "You practically slammed the front door, then you dropped something in the hallway, and I don't know about Yuusuke, but I could tell when you took your shoes off."

His partner shot him an exasperated glance even as Yuusuke snickered into his hand. "Thank you for your support."

"Always."

Kuwabara gave Yuusuke a considering glance, obviously trying to decide if it was worth trying to pry him out of his seat. Apparently deciding that it wasn't worth the fight, he took the seat intended for gests and sprawled, arms behind his head, long legs stretched out in front of him. "So whatever happened to the locket?"

"Genkai gave me a box to put it in."

"A warded cedar box," Kurama added, when Kuwabara seemed about to protest. "Which Yuusuke nailed shut."

"And gave to Botan," Yuusuke added. "And she gave it to Koenma."

And Koenma had promptly lost it in the chaos that was his office, which Botan had reported back to them with a roll of her eyes. But it was in the Spirit World now, and Koenma's office was heavily guarded. Kurama figured it was enough.

Kuwabara seemed to think so too, because he just grunted and closed his eyes. He was still tired much of the day, but Kurama knew that would pass. Kuwabara had sought the two of them out. He had mentioned the locket. That was a good sign.

"I've been working on something," Kurama said just as Yuusuke opened his mouth to, no doubt, say something utterly provocative and/or infuriating. "When you get a moment, I'd appreciate your input. I feel it's a good step forward for our business."

Kuwabara cracked an eyelid and regarded him. "Does this in anyway involve that private investigator's calendar photo shoot Yuusuke was trying to talk us into?"

"No," Kurama said. "There will be no nude photo shoots."

"I still say that could have worked," Yuusuke muttered. "You guys _need_ the money. They were paying for hot PIs to get naked for them. Kurama at least would have made some money out of the whole thing. Kuwabara, they probably would have paid you to keep your clothes on if you played your cards right."

Kurama winced slightly as Kuwabara knocked Yuusuke's chair out from under him, then sighed as Yuusuke caught Kuwabara in a headlock and wrestled him to the floor. "You know," Kurama said, pitching his voice to be heard over the noise of their roughhousing, "I've always thought there was something very homo-erotic about the way you two always seem to end up rolling around on the floor together."

Yuusuke, who was straddling Kuwabara's hips, collapsed into laughter. Unfortunately he collapsed more or less on top of Kuwabara, who shoved at his head until Yuusuke flopped off to the floor. "Hair gel," Kuwabara said sourly, wiping his hands clean on the back of Yuusuke's shirt.

"Maybe Kuwabara and I should pose for the calendar shoot," Yuusuke said. "I can be the hot and sexy Yakuza assassin he's bringing to justice."

"And it just keeps getting kinkier," Kurama said.

Kuwabara flipped him off as he stood. "Please stop encouraging him. He's like a stray dog, you know. If you keep feeding him, he'll only come back, chew up our newspaper and piss on our porch."

"I'll piss on something all right, you son of a-" And they were back on the floor.

Kurama stepped around the tangle of limbs as Kuwabara shoved Yuusuke's face in the carpet and threatened to get a rolled up newspaper. "I'll just leave this on your desk then," he said. "For when you have a moment."

"What is it?" Kuwabara asked. "And it better not have anything to do with photo shoots-" He yelped as Yuusuke did something Kurama couldn't see from an angle and flailed. "Stop that, stop that, you _suck_!"

"He's ticklish," Yuusuke reported cheerfully, before Kuwabara's foot caught him in the side of the head."

"It's a revised rate sheet," Kurama said, even though no one was listening to him anymore. He was used to it. "We really, really need to start charging more."

* * *

End


End file.
